Of Monsters and Fatherhood
by IceDynamiteDragonflyStars
Summary: You look at the large body curled on the floor, trying to reach you, and you decide you'll let it live. (200th Anniversary fic.)


**Me: *Is making a fucking webcomic for the 200th anniversary***

 **Me: Ya but I need an overdone AU on Fanfiction dot net too.**

 **Disclaimer: Yeah, no, I'm Mary Shelley raised from the dead. I own this work right here. It's canon now. Forget that other stuff I wrote where everyone died. Early draft.**

 **(Although the public domain does mean I legally could profit from this if I so pleased. Sweet.)**

 **Also, I apologise for use of the Forbidden POV. I'm pretentious like that.**

* * *

When it opens its eyes to look at you for the first time you think you might vomit. It's hideous. A blank, pale stare, shrivelled yellow skin, blackened lips. It looks, well, dead. It lurches upwards, attempting to sit. Your stomach twists. Nonononono. You didn't want this. You don't want it anywhere near you. If you were strong enough, you would have it dead.

As it is, you are not strong enough, so you simply retch dryly into the wastepaper basket. You're only lucky you haven't eaten in two days. Your legs feel like they could snap, but you manage to lurch towards bed, collapsing immediately.

Your dreams are filled with horror. Which is to be expected.

You don't care to remember them when you wake. You almost don't remember the _t_ _hing_ until you barely avoid tripping over it. It's curled in a (relatively, for its size) tiny ball on the floorboards, breaths coming in painful rattles. You shut your eyes. It sounds almost exactly like your mother just before she...

You step gingerly around the body. You don't have food, and you wonder what to do about that. Starve? Sure, you can starve. It doesn't really matter, you suppose, because now what are you staying alive for? Before yesterday it was to create the thing. Now... What? Go back to school? You've made life, pathetic as it is. What will time in a classroom learning of anatomy you have laid out do for you?

You have a family. You could go back.

You glance at the grotesque figure, then quickly away as a wave of nausea overtakes you. What will you do with this? You have nothing with which to end it.

Starve together? God, the thing's probably no better than an object anyway. Inviable. Yes, you think, its brain will probably never support that body. You'll probably be found by the landlord in a month's time, your family will move on, and really if it wasn't perfect you've failed in your endeavour to make life anyway.

You think you'll go back to sleep.

* * *

You're woken by something wet on your neck. You lie still. You aren't sure why you feel so empty, but honestly waking up to check isn't worth it.

Floorboards creak away from you. You lapse into dozing until more water is poured onto your face. Your eyes snap open.

Something is leaning over you, staring, yellowed eyes narrowed. Oh god, the thing. You wriggle weakly back. You don't want it touching you.

Its hands shake violently as it presses one of your cups to your lips. It tips too far and, again, the water streams down your face. And you manage to choke on what does get in. It starts back as you cough and retch. You shakily sit up. Well. Not dead, either of you. And the thing is... Not braindead or homicidal. Still a failure, naturally—you only choked because it shocked you, and you were aiming for perfection.

You're frustrated, though. Where did it get the water and how did it know you needed it? You stop choking, reaching out to the thing, hoping it can understand.

It leans back towards the bed, and you grab the cup. There's not much in it, but you drink it down anyway. The monster smiles, and you shut your eyes. It dashes off, rapidly returning with more water. You know better than to drink too much when you're already dehydrated.

Still, like a child, it is eager to please, and whenever you slowly drain a cup it will dash off for more water.

Finally, you are able to stand, pull on some reasonable clothes and tie back your now overgrown hair. The thing follows you about like a puppy, and you're pretty sure it cries when you lock the door. Still, you can't risk it being seen.

You return with food. The monster watches you eat, quickly mimicking you.

You decide you'll keep it alive.

* * *

It's more intelligent than you could have hoped. Its hands stop shaking, its movements smooth. It can feed itself, drink, dress. You generally sit and read, because you have nothing else to do. You don't even know what month it is. Winter, you're quite certain.

The thing is that the thing can't speak, and you don't know why. You made the vocal chords well, you know you did.

It's only when you see it curiously touching at your lab equipment that you realise. "Stop that," you snap on impulse.

It babbles like a child. "Ah—sh, sht."

Right. It's attempting to imitate you. And you haven't talked to it... Ever? Well, that would explain its lack of speech.

So you talk to it, simply gesturing to things around your room and curtly naming them. At first, the creature imitates, pointing and letting out short strings of gibberish. At first, you praise its efforts, until you realise the patterns repeat. It's trying to name the things itself. So you simply correct it into silence, until it can name household objects in a rough but understandable voice.

You move onto concepts. You aren't sure how to explain the world, so you begin with your part of it. Geneva: the lakes, the mountains, the weather. You dodge around your family, because you know he'll be wanting one. But you feel safe talking about your one friend, Clerval. And the monster listens, and gradually learns to talk back, asking questions and prying deeper into your life.

You don't know when you stop thinking of the creature as a 'he' over an 'it', but it feels only natural.

* * *

It learns letters and grammar faster than a human could ever hope to, and you end up spending most of your time reading. He understands he can't leave quite yet. You both skirt around the topic, really. Your family sends money for food, and you leave to buy. You know you can't stay away forever, but you're going to put it off.

He's skimming some novel today, frowning heavily. You turn back to Elizabeth's letters. You have begin to desperately miss her.

"Do you have a name?"

You look across the room at the creature. "Yes," you say slowly. He raises an eyebrow. "Victor Frankenstein." You say.

He nods, taking in this new piece of information. "And me?"

"Pick one," you say. God, you want to be home. You'd trade anything for it.

He pauses. "I shall think about it."

He picks Adam, and you almost smile. Nothing you love like a good metaphor.

You let him have your surname.

* * *

You can sense his frustration with staying in the room, and he can sense yours with being in Germany.

You don't want his opinions on what to say in your letter, and he doesn't offer any, but you can see the mixed emotions in his face.

You want to come home for summer. You are taking a friend and they are not to be alarmed by his appearance, nor are they to comment on it. You want a large carriage sent. ( _Yours, Victor._ )

* * *

You're almost home. Adam has long pulled down his hood to stare out the carriage window, and you have long since joined him. You can sense his wonder at mountains, lakes, the residual snow. And you're his mirror.

Your family will reject him. You anticipate this, because you are at the end of a day a cynic. Maybe he does too. You share so many of the same moods, reactions, habits, but at the end of the day you are not a mind reader.

You're only a miracle worker.

You can turn them around. Your story is unbelievable, but you have lab notes to back it up. If they ask, you will explain in full. Then you will hide your notes. You were so close to failure, if anybody tries doing what you did... Everything could crash about them.

Your family will learn to tolerate him. He is well-spoken enough to convince them he is worthy of not being kicked to the curb. And if they still insist, you will insist harder.

You turn back to your creature. Hopefully he will find something to do with his life. You're sure you can move onto other things now he's made. Perhaps he can help.

After all, if your first experiment was a success, what's stopping you now?

* * *

 **So, this was an AU where Vic raised the monster, clearly, only he stayed in the house instead of going and having a panic attack on the street and I guess Clerval... Didn't show up to check on him, idk**

 **Also his mother died of tuberculosis, which is why difficult breathing was sort of a traumatising sound to him.**

 **Idk if it came across as slashy, it wasn't. Frankenstein is clearly gay for H.G. Wells's Invisible man. (Yes, there's a story there.)**


End file.
